Words Have Power

May 3, 2009

By now, I think everyone knows the power of changing“but” to “and”, as in“I love you AND that Laz-y-Boy has to go.”Put your “but” in there and it takes away all the groundyou’ve gained with the “I love you” part.Words have power.And the power to em-power you, if used purposefully.Take a look at this one:“I’m always late.”Or, as Rick Carson’s Taming Your Gremlin suggests,“Until now, my tendency has been to be late.”The former is an absolute with no room for change.The later leaves space for you to decide to do things differently.Starting now.I listen closely to my clients for any thought that beginswith “I just need to…”Any time you “just need to” you can pretty well betyou’re not going to.It’s almost always coming from an external source.Think about the last time someone gave you advise.Did that advise start with “You just need to…”?Now, if you change that need to a want…Wants come from an internal source, are grounded in emotionand much more likely to be acted upon.Wants are empowering; needs are overpowering.Enough said.

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